June 26, 2019 | LetsRun.com

USATF Incompetence

LRC USA Track and Field Tries To Hide The Fact That They Messed Up BIG TIME, Quietly Names New Pan Am Team update: Was a microsoft excel sorting error the cause of some of this? Instead of issuing a press release admitting they butchered the national team selection for the Pan Am Games, USATF today took the unprofessional route and simply changed the names on the web page they published on Monday without telling anyone. Kind of like how they changed the qualifying criteria without telling anyone either. An emergency Section 9 arbitration hearing is taking place tonight.
*MB: USATF completely botches selection of 2019 Pan American Games team

LRC USATF Makes It Up As It Goes Along (Again), Ignores Its Own Selection Procedures For 2019 Pan American Games USATF said it was would pick the 2019 Pan Am team based on the 2019 US descending order list as of June 10, 2019. Then on June 20, it said it would actually use the 2018-19 list. Now the team is out and we have no idea what criteria they used.

Corruption / Doping News

Lamine Diack To Finally Stand Trial In France On Corruption Charges Diack has been under house arrest since November 2015 for various charges including money laundering, cover-ups and bribes. *AP Article
Five Others, Including Diack’s Son, Papa Massata Diack, And Russia’s Former Athletics Chief Valentin Balakhnichev, Will Also Be Tried However, Senegal has rejected requests to extradite the younger Diack.
Another Kenyan Distance Runner Gets Suspension After Failing Drug Test This is a second offence for 2:30:47 woman Salome Jerono Biwott, who got a two-year ban in 2013. *Discuss

Jamaican Champs *Results

Final Day: Elaine Thompson (22.00) Completes Sprint Double Over SAFP (22.22) Rasheed Dwyer won the men’s 200 in just 20.23 as Yohan Blake ran 20.27.
Women’s 100m Hurdles Abandoned At Jamaican Champs After Huge Controversy Initally 2015 world champ Danielle Williams refused to leave the track after getting the DQ. Then things got even weirder.
Shericka Jackson (49.78) And Demish Gaye (44.83) Win 400 Titles
Friday: Elaine Thompson Beats Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce To Win Jamaican 100m Title As Both Clock 10.73 Thompson got the win by three-thousandths of a second (10.726 to 10.729) in the first race in history in which two women broke 10.75. Briana Williams set a world U18 best of 10.94 for third. Yohan Blake won the men’s 100m in a SB of 9.96 while Kemar Mowatt (48.70) and Rushell Clayton (54.73) got upset victories in the 400H. *MB: Elaine Thompson – 10.73 +0.6 WL
*Video Of Women’s 100 *Video Of Yohan Blake’s 9.96 Win
*Despite Loss At Jamaican Trials, SAFP Is Thrilled With How Things Are Going “Coming back from having a baby, I am doing for some people the impossible. … I hope that I can leave this as inspiration for the young women and men who are coming up to understand that it doesn’t matter what your setback is as long as you come back and you keep fighting and you endure until the end.”
*MileSplit: Briana Williams Smashes US High School 100m Record With 10.94 Williams said she’s sick with a fever and will seek medical exemption from the 200m, but “chase a top-3 Jamaican time” later on to try to get a Worlds spot.
*Jamaican Junior Championships Recap: Shaquille Lowe Wins Boys LJ With 7.33m
Rushell Clayton And Kemar Mowatt Pull Off Stunning 400m Hurdles Upsets At Jamaican Nationals Mowatt was 4th at 2018 NCAAs for Arkansas. Pre-race women’s favorite Janieve Russell was stunned when she only finished 4th.

Sprint News

Sha’Carri Richardson (66.5%) And Divine Oduduru (44.0%) Lead After 1 Day Of Bowerman Voting
JUCO Star Kenny Bednarek’s Whirlwind Year Has Resumed Overseas The 19.49w and 44.83 man, who had signed with Oregon but was academically ineligible, ran the Rabat DL (20.51) and Ostrava (47.02).

Semenya Updates

The Telegraph: Caster Semenya Could Be Eligible To Race 800m In The UK As Testosterone Ruling May Be Legally Unenforceable There A lawyer specializing in equality law and human rights said the DSD regulations “give rise to direct sex discrimination” under UK and EU law because they apply only to women and not men.
AP: Documents From Caster Semenya Court Case Reveal The IAAF Accused Her Of Purposely Running Slowly At Times To Hide Her Advantage Semenya angrily denied the accusation.
LRC MB Archives: Caster Semenya-not trying in races
SEMENYA LOST
Is it official now – Semenya either loses races on purpose (or her hormone treatment is changed?)?
Semenya is a consistent sandbagger

Distance Stuff

It’s Pride Month A Pride Month Ode To Nikki Hiltz And Therese Haiss Former Cornell runner David Melly praises Hiltz as a LGBTQ role model 50 years after the Stonewall Inn raid in New York City.
Recommended Read: IAAF Profile On Refugee Runner Jamal Abdelmaji Eisa Mohammed, Who Fled The Violence In Sudan To Earn Money To Help His Family At age 17, Mohammed traveled by foot for over a week, including three days crossing the desert, to reach Israel. Now he’s a 28:47 10,000m runner and dreaming of the 2020 Olympics.
MB: Morgan McDonald Goes Pro, Signs With Total Sports
From Last Week: 17-Year-Old Ryuji Miura Breaks 30-Year-Old Japanese Citizen High School Steeplechase Record With 8:39

Mid-Week Track Action – Ostrava Golden Spike *Full Results

LRC Shaunae Miller-Uibo Sets World Women’s 300 World Record* Of 34.41 In Ostrava, Andre De Grasse (19.91) Nips Christian Coleman In Men’s 200 Watch both races in this article. Meet also included a win by Amel Tuka in the men’s 800 (1:44.95), a win by Charlie Grice in the men’s mile (3:56.95) and Gudaf Tsegay in the women’s 1,500 (4:02.95). *IAAF Full Meet Recap

Doping News: Russia, What Are We Going To Do With You?

RUSADA Reveals Cases Against 33 Athletes (19 T&F) After Investigation Into Sports Academy Finds Doctor Giving Them Intravenous Infusions Of Banned Substances RUSADA head Yuri Ganus said that is just the “first package” of cases and a planned second package could take the number to 70.
No Duh: RUSADA Director General Says The Russian Track Federation Is Unlikely To Be Reinstated In Its Current State
AP: Russian Track And Field Faces Wave Of Disciplinary Cases Seven athletes are accused of training in secret with a banned coach.
AIU Confirms Receipt OF Moscow Lab Data From WADA The AIU has begin analyzing the data (110,000 files) and will eventually report the findings to the IAAF.
Russia Submits 305 More Neutral Athlete Applications To The IAAF Interestingly, the Russian federation received 315 applications, but apparently there were ten of them they didn’t even bother sending.
IAAF Denies Promising Russia Reinstatement For Worlds After Russian State TV Quoted Top Track Official Saying He Had Received Guarantees The TV report also quoted him as saying World HJ champ Mariya Lasitskene could lose her neutral status for criticizing him. Either the TV report was BS or this guy needs to lose his job. (Probably both.)
Non-Russian Doping: Iran’s Asian Games Steeple Champ Hosein Keyhani Banned For Doping The 8:22 steepler tested positive for EPO. The AIU also says that India’s former Asian 5,000 champ Sanjeevhani Jadav has been provisionally suspended after failing a doping test.

Youth News: USATF U20 Champs Start Friday

Matthew Boling Nominated For “Best Record-Setting Performance” ESPY Award He is up against tough competition with Saints’ Drew Brees and Golden State’s Klay Thompson nominated in the same category.
USATF Preview For This Weekend’s USATF Under-20 Outdoor Championships In Florida
Kayla Davis’ 51.17 In The NBNO Last Weekend 400m Was An Age-15 World Best

163 Pages Of Info On The Caster Semenya CAS Case

LRC What You Need To Know From The 163-Page Caster Semenya Vs. IAAF CAS Decision Veteran journalist Amby Burfoot has read the full 163-page decision, which was released on Tuesday, in its entirety, and offers his take on the most interesting details that were revealed.

AP: IAAF Claimed Caster Semenya Was “Biologically Male” With A “Female Gender Identity” *Discuss
IAAF Releases Statement Thanking CAS For Releasing Full Findings From Caster Semenya CAS Case “Having the arguments of all parties and the detailed findings of the CAS Panel in the public domain will help to foster greater understanding of this complex issue …”
Caster Semenya Accuses IAAF Of Using Her As A “Guinea Pig” Semenya claims they’ve used her to “experiment” with how the medication affected testosterone. She also says taking the medication caused her to feel sick and gain weight.
Full 163-Page CAS Award On Caster Semenya Case

Our Weekly Recap – The Week That Was

WTW Meet The Fastest Loser In History And The Two 17-Year-Old 800 Phenoms, Plus What Does The US Women’s Soccer Team And US Men’s Marathoners Have In Common? This week, we introduce you to a second 1:45 17-year-old that few are talking about and remind you once again that life isn’t fair.

June 25th Was Gabriele Grunewald Day In Minnesota

Minnesota Names June 25th As “Gabriele Grunewald Day” As The Running Community Joins Together In Her Honor On What Would Have Been Her 33rd Birthday There will be a short group run starting at 6:15PM tonight in Minneapolis. The run will be 1.405 miles as 1405 was Gabe’s favorite number.
Article And Video From Kare11.com: “Gabe Day” Run Honors The Life Of Gabriele Grunewald Includes video interview with Gabe’s sister Abby Anderson and husband Justin Grunewald.
Flotrack Tribute Video To Gabe Grunewald

Grandma’s Marathon:

American Nell Rojas Dominates Women’s Race And Gets Olympic Standard (2:28:06) Not bad for someone who was just hoping to break 2:45 in her debut in December. She is the daughter of former 15,000 WR holder Ric Rojas.
*Boniface Kongin Buys Own Bib, Runs 2:06 Pace For 19 Miles Then Holds On For Narrow Win Over American Andrew Colley

European Track Action

17-Year-Old Max Burgin Front Runs 1:45.39! The British teenager is amazingly good for his age.
Decastar: Nafissatou Thiam Appeared To Be Well On Her Way To A PR And European Record Until She Re-Injured Her Elbow In Penultimate Event Despite only taking 2 javelin throws, she won with 6819. Pierce LePage won the men’s competition with a huge 8453 PR.
Nafissatou Thiam (4133) Led After Day 1 As Kevin Mayer Purposely Scored 0 Points In 2 Events “I’m in the build-up for the Doha World Championships. It would be stupid to get injured at this moment of the season,” said Mayer.
*Thiam Cleared A Heptathlon World’s Best Of 2.02 In HJ
Luke Matthews Misses WC Standard By .03 – Runs 3:36.03 In France

More Road Action

Fancy Chemutai (30:36) Smashes Shalane Flanagan’s Course Record at BAA 10k, David Bett Sprints To Men’s Title in 28:08 Top American honors went to Brian Shrader (7th, 29:11) and Aliphine Tuliamuk (8th, 32:27).
*MB: Fancy Chemutai’s 30:36 BAA 10K doesn’t seem right to me – it was so hot today.
Canadians Ben Preisner (65:41) And Natasha Wodak (71:21) Win Scotiabank Vancouver Half Marathons

USATF U20 Champs Results Entries Schedule Webcast (Requires RS+) *Meet Home

IAAF Recap Of US U20 Champs: Matthew Boling Wins 100 (10.15, 2.3m/s) And 200m (20.36, 0.7m/s) At US U20s HSer Justin Robinson, who turned 17 in March and ran 44.84 a few weeks ago, won the 400 title in 45.59. Athing Mu won the women’s 800.
Matthew Boling Only Finished 3rd In LJ (Misses Out On Pan Am Team)
Kentucky’s Tai Brown And Oregon’s Eric Edwards Jr.Both Tie Meet Record (13.21) At USATF U20 Outdoor Championships Brown got the narrow win, but remember the hurdles are just 39 inches (versus 42 inches in the NCAA).
Penn Throwers Marc Minichello And Mayyi Maha Rock Men’s Javelin And Women’s Hammer At USATF U20 Outdoor Championships Minichello is now #2 on the US junior list (253 feet, 1 inch (77.15m)) in the javelin while Maha is #3 on the US women’s U20 list in the hammer (215-5 (65.66m)).
DyeStat Day 1 Recap: College Freshman Capture All Four Titles Notre Dame’s Danny Kilrea (31:38) won the 10,000 in while Michigan’s Jessi Larson (16:47) won the women’s 5,000.
USATF Day 1 Highlights: Missouri Athletes Went 1-2 In The Women’s Javelin
DyeStat: 10 Story Lines To Follow At USATF U20 Outdoor Championships

Non-Distance

Recommended Read: Former Swedish National Champion HJer Erika Kinsey Talks About How She Quit The Sport When She Was Young Due To Burnout From Obsessing Too Much She says moving to the US for college taught her she didn’t have to be so serious and “could go have McDonald’s” after meets. She’s still competing at DL meets, but does fun things like playing in a weekly hockey game.
IAAF Profile On South African 200m Record Holder Clarence Munyai (19.69 PR) Munyai has a twin brother that was also a fast sprinter, but lost interest. Munyai, on the other hand, moved away from his family at age 16 to work with an experienced coach at a different high school.
NCAA Champ Sha’Carri Richardson Will Take On Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce And English Gardner In The Pre Classic 100m
“What Were You Thinking” Podcast Interview With Christian Taylor And Sam Kendricks
Former British Sprinter Jeanette Kwakye Talks About Being Friends With Jessica Ennis-Hill And How They Will Team Up As BBC Reporters During Worlds 2019

New Stadium News

Stadium Revamp Plans Revealed For Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games Capacity will be increased permanently from 12,700 to 18,000, with up to 40,000 during the Games through additional temporary seating.
Former UK Athletics Head Ed Warner Is Afraid New Birmingham Stadium Could Turn Into A “White Elephant” He suspects that Birmingham will lose its Diamond League when the IAAF’s new system takes effect and the stadium will be much bigger and near impossible to fill with fans.
West Virginia Has A Brand New Track, But No PlansTo Re-Instate The Men’s Track Team

Olympic / World News

USOC Announces Name Change To United States Olympic And Paralympic Committee So apparently it will now be abbreviated to “USOPC.”
Is This A Good Or Bad Idea? IOC To Ask Cities To Hold Referendum Before Submitting Olympic Bid If you’re going to have a referendum, you should definitely do it before bidding, but many cities end up hosting without ever having one. Could this open up a can of worms?
IOC Announces 37 Scholarship Holders In Contention For Refugee Olympic Team At Tokyo 2020 Ten of the athletes are the group who formed the inaugural refugee team at Rio 2016.
AW: Doha 2019: A Look At The Leaders With 100 Days To Go
UK Athletics Appoints Chris Clark As New Chair They have also begun search for a new CEO after Niels de Vos left in September to lead the Oregon 21, the organizing committee for 2021 Worlds.
Tokyo 2020 To Unveil Olympic Medal Designs At One-Year-To-Go Ceremony On July 24
IOC Set To Lift Suspension On India Hosting Major Events After Government Provides Guarantees iIt Will Grant Athletes From All Nations Visas To Enter The Country This is after two Pakistani athletes were refused entry after a Pakistani militant group terrorist attack.

Week That Was / Podcast

LRC Podcast: Jama Aden Raid Anniversary, Jenny Simpson’s Medal Chances, Who Who Would You Rather Be: Josh Kerr, Drew Hunter Or Grant Fisher?

LRC Who Has The 2019 Worlds Standards? Plus Young 800m Stars Max Burgin & Roisin Willis Run Fast Elinor Purrier got her second Worlds qualifier this past week. Who else has the Worlds standards for America? Leonard Korir and Kirubel Erassa got it in the 10,000m. Updated with info on Josh Kerr breaking Steve Cram‘s U23 GBR record.

Non-Distance News

Recommended Read: Tim Layden For SI: “Is High School Sprint Phenom And Viral Star Matthew Boling The Future Of Track?” Before Boling had his viral race he had 1500 Instagram followers. Now he has 105,000.
NCAA 110H Runner-Up Daniel Roberts Signs With Nike
IAAF Inside Athletics: Video Interview With France’s Decathlon WR Holder Kevin Mayer Mayer says he was sad when Ashton Eaton retired because he felt like the competition makes him better, so the only way he could beat him was to break his WR.

Upcoming Action

July 9: MB: Donavan Brazier Entered In 1500m At The Sunset Tour Meet In Asuza, CA What do you predict he’ll run?
Sunday: Christian Coleman Leads Pre 100m Field Against Justin Gatlin, Zharnel Hughes And Cravon Gillespie Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce faces Sha’Carri Richardson, English Gardner, double world silver medalist Marie-Josee Ta Lou in the women’s race.
July 12: Genzebe Dibaba Will Take On Beatrice Chepkoech And Sifan Hassan In The Monaco DL Brave Like Gabe Mile The men’s 1,500 will have world champ Elijah Manangoi vs. indoor WR holder Samuel Tefera and Matthew Centrowitz. Also a stacked TJ with rivals Christian Taylor, Pedro Pablo Pichardo and Will Claye.
August 6-10: USATF Announce 2019 Pan Am Games Roster Distance runners competing in Lima, Peru include Donavan Brazier, Garrett Heath, Allie Ostrander, Kim Conley, Alexa Efraimson, Nikki Hiltz.

Other News That Passed Our Vetting Process

Interesting Read Gordon Mack Exposes The #1 Flaw In The IAAF Rankings – They TOTALLY Undervalue NCAAs And USAs Cravon Gillespie’s 9.93 at NCAAs is worth less than Cameron Burrell‘s 10.12 at the NACACs. Bryce Hoppel‘s 1:44.41 win at NCAAs is worth less than Erik Sowinski‘s 1:47.49 at the Torun indoor meet.
Despite His Nike Ties, French Newspaper Reports Seb Coe Had Told French Police He Voted To Hand 2019 World Championships To Doha, Not Eugene
Callum Hawkins Is Not Scared Of Doha Heat, Vows To “Get Monkey Off Back” After CG Collapse He correctly points out that the sun is the thing to be feared at the the Doha WC marathon starts at 11:59 PM. Plus training with “heat chamber therapy” will get him ready.
IOC Formally Opens $145M New Switzerland HQ 125 Years After Olympics Were Revived
Mutaz Essa Barshim Has Recovered From Ankle Injury, Will Compete For 1st Time Since Last July Today In Poland
Tokyo 2020 Tickets Are Next To Impossible For Japanese Fans To Get – Less Than 3% Get Tickets In Lottery Brett Larner had a little better success at 3/28 (10.7%) but stadium seating for the men’s marathon wasn’t one of them.
*MB: My goodness, how can this possibly be true? Stadium seating for 2020 Olympic men’s marathon finish is SOLD OUT.
The 5 Kinds Of Strava Posters Braggart isn’t an option.
A Pride Month Ode To Nikki Hiltz And Therese Haiss Former Cornell runner David Melly praises Hiltz as a LGBTQ role model 50 years after the Stonewall Inn raid in New York City.

Kenyan African Champs Trials

2017 World Cross-Country Bronze Medalist Lilian Kasait And Unheralded Robert Kiprop WIn 5,000s At African Champ Trials In Kenya 2018 World Junior champ Edward Zakayo also made the team.
Edwin Soi Upsets Favorite, Olympic Silver Medalist Paul Tanui, To Win 10,000m At Kenyan African Games Trials Soi ran 27:55.30 to Tanui’s 27:58.06.
Hellen Syombua Shatters Kenyan 400m Record With 51.18 To Win The Kenyan African Games Trials 800m man Emmanuel Korir stepped down to the 400m and won in 44.55.

Harry Jerome Results Meet Home

Aaron Brown Overcomes Chilly Conditions To Win The Harry Jerome 100m In 10.30 US’s Shannon Osika won the 1,500m in 4:09.76; Reid Buchanan won the 3,000 (7:55.09). *Results *Meet Home
Canada’s Regan Yee Misses Steeplechase Standard Of 9:40.00 By .06
Canadian 100m Record Holder Bruny Surin’s Daughter Just Graduated From UConn And Has Run 52.44 For 400, Needs 51.80 To Make It To Worlds

More Upcoming

Sunday: Boston Marathon Champions, Olympians And NCAA Titlists To Race 2019 B.A.A. 10K Two-time BAA 10k champ Stephen Sambu and Daniel Chebii face Geoffrey Koech (27:18), 58:42 half runner Stephen Kiprop and Abdi Abdirahman. Aliphine Tuliamuk, former Boston champ Caroline Rotich, Betsy Saina and 30:06 woman Fancy Chemutai lead the women’s race.
Saturday: WR Holder Kevin Mayer And Olympic Champ Nafissatou Thiam Lead Fields For Decastar Multi Event Meet
Sunday: IAAF Preview Of Broken Arrow Skyrace In The Sierra Nevada Mountains In California Britain’s Andrew Douglas faces US’s 2016 world mountain running champ Joseph Gray. USA’s Kasie Enman and Morgan Arritola are the women’s favorites.
July 5: 49 Global Medalists Set For Lausanne DL Emmanuel Korir, Ferguson Rotich, Adam Kszczot and Brandon McBride in the 800m, Noah Lyles vs. Andre de Grasse, Ramil Guliyev and Christophe Lemaitre in the 200m, Justin Gatlin vs. Michael Rodgers in the 100m, Mariya Lasitskene in the HJ.
Tokyo Olympics Organizers To Test Heatstroke Prevention Measures Over The Next Couple Of Months

NCAA News *The Bowerman Fan Vote

Florida’s Grant Holloway, LSU’s Mondo Duplantis And Texas Tech’s Divine Oduduru Are The Men’s Finalists For The 2019 Bowerman Award You can vote here (up to 5 times a day) from now until June 27.
Arkansas’ Janeek Brown, Florida’s Yanis David And LSU’s Sha’Carri Richardson Are The Women’s Finalists For The 2019 Bowerman Award You can vote here (up to 5 times a day) from now until June 27.
T&F News Chooses Grant Holloway As Their Collegiate Men’s Athlete Of The Year They said he narrowly edged out Divine Oduduru for the award.
Sha’Carri Richardson Is T&F News’s Women’s NCAA Athlete Of The Year
Mick Byrne Among Eight Wisconsin Coaches To Receive “Routine One-Year Contract Extensions”
Chris Woods Named Mississippi State Head Track Coach
Assistant Coach Vince Anderson Leaves Texas A&M
USTFCCCA Gives Its Excellence In Communications Awards For The 2019 Track Season

Going Pro

Grant Fisher Joins The Bowerman Track Club
*MB: Fisher to BTC
Oregon’s Four-Time NCAA Champ Jessica Hull Turns Pro The Aussie distance runner gives up her final season of eligibility to sign with Total Sports US.
*MB: Jessica Hull turns pro
*MB: Jessica Hull is going to sign with Brooks…. Calling it

African Distance News

Eliud Kipchoge Has Started His Training To Try To Break 2 Hours “I think a good career is where you give yourself a challenge every now and then and so I think it is high time for me to try another challenge by beating the two-hour mark.”
A Lot Of Top Kenyans Are Skipping The African Games In Morocco This Year Reigning Africa 5,000m champ Edward Zakay explained why he isn’t gong: “Kenyans trials are no joke. They are explosive with new names merging each year. I am not in my best form and I don’t want to embarrass myself running in the semis and finals.”
Olympic Refugee Runner Yiech Pur Biel Says Competing At Rio 2016 Changed His Life Biel was one of the original 10 refugee athletes to compete at the Olympics and now he’s a Board member of the Olympic Refuge Foundation.